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In October 2019, Liu and his colleagues published a paper in Nature, describing an even newer technology, called prime editing. Prime editing can not only make all twelve of the possible base substitutions, it can also make multiple-base insertions or deletions, without requiring a double-strand break. It achieves this with a multi-step operation that first cuts one strand, then performs the appropriate substitution, insertion, or deletion, and then nicks the second strand to allow the bases on the second strand to be replaced by bases that complement the ones substituted, inserted into or deleted from the first strand. The result is a modified stretch of DNA that had never been completely separated. This has the effect of massively reducing the number of off-target modifications.

This new prime editing variant of CRISPR technology, can make the same corrections to the defects that cause sickle cell disease and beta-thalassemia that standard CRISPR/Cas9 has now made in human subjects, but with less opportunity for unwanted off-target changes. Furthermore, its possible applicability is much wider. The ClinVar database lists over 75,000 pathogenic mutations in the human genome. Of these, over 89% are potentially correctable by prime editing.

Continue reading “Gene Editing is Advancing at Breakneck Speed” »

Newborn screening covers more than 30 conditions. Yet, with genome sequencing, we could screen newborns for several thousand genetic conditions.

In the surveys’ open-ended responses about risks of genome sequencing, parents and clinicians both expressed concerns about psychological distress related to difficult or uncertain results. Clinicians were more likely to raise concerns about returning results for adult-onset conditions, unnecessary parental stress over health problems that might never actually occur, and the possibility of future discrimination against the child on the basis of their genomic information.

Continue reading “Is It Too Soon to Consider Genome Sequencing for Newborns?” »

Bill-gates-thinks-gene-editing-artificial-intelligence-save-world.

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has been working to improve the state of global health through his nonprofit foundation for 20 years, and today he told the nation’s premier scientific gathering that advances in artificial intelligence and gene editing could accelerate those improvements exponentially in the years ahead.

“We have an opportunity with the advance of tools like artificial intelligence and gene-based editing technologies to build this new generation of health solutions so that they are available to everyone on the planet. And I’m very excited about this,” Gates said in Seattle during a keynote address at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Continue reading “Why Bill Gates thinks gene editing and artificial intelligence could save the world” »

Dr. Theodore Ho talks about the rapidly expanding possibilities of stem cells to be used in reversing or slowing the aging process. He discusses his previous and current work with the brain, including such methods as tissue clearing, multifiber photometry and optogenetics, and single resolution calcium imaging and control. Dr. Ho is a neuroscientist and stem cell biologist studying the mechanisms and causes of biological aging and potential strategies to slow or reverse them, in order to prevent the onset of age

Associated diseases to help us live healthier and longer lives.

Continue reading “Aging and Stem Cells | Theodore Ho | TEDxMiddlebury” »

AZOKH, Nagorno-Karabakh (People of Ar)—Scholars from Britain, US, Denmark and Armenia led by Professor Levon Yepiskoposyan have been examining prehistoric caves near the village of Azokh in Artsakh (Nagorno Karabakh) and found unique artifacts from different periods, among them a tooth from a human who lived 7000 years ago. Due to the cave’s climate DNA was preserved inside the tooth and was send to Copenhagen University’s genetics department (in Denmark) for examination. The results of this inquiry have revealed that the genetic makeup of the tooth belonging to an individual 7000 years ago perfectly matches with the genetic makeup of modern Armenians.

“This is the conclusion we’ve reached after numerous excavations carried out on the territory of Karabakh, where we examined more than a dozen caves, among them the cave of Azokh and Alexan Uzes,” Yepiskoposyan said.

An American biotech company says it created a coronavirus vaccine three hours after getting access to the virus’ genetic sequence in mid-January, and now scientists are racing to get the vaccine on the market in record time.

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Inovio Pharmaceuticals is based in Pennsylvania, but scientists in its laboratory in San Diego made the discovery.

Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) is looking into ways to speed up DNA-based cold storage in a $25m Scalable Molecular Archival Software and Hardware (SMASH) project.

DNA is a biopolymer molecule composed from two chains in a double helix formation, and carrying genetic information. The chains are made up from nucleotides containing one of four nucleobases; cytosine ©, guanine (G), adenine (A) and thymine (T). Both chains carry the same data, which is encoded into sequences of the four nucleobases.

GTRI senior research scientist Nicholas Guise said in a quote that DNA storage is “so compact that a practical DNA archive could store an exabyte of data, equivalent to a million terabyte hard drives, in a volume about the size of a sugar cube.”

For the first time, scientists have sequenced the entire genetic code of a giant squid.

Because the massive creature has never been captured alive, biologists have largely been left in the dark as to how the giant squid grows and behaves. After sequencing its genes, University of Copenhagen and Marine Biological Laboratory researchers found several oddities in the giant squid’s DNA — genes that are rarely found in other invertebrates, for instance — giving scientists new tools with which understand the bizarre animals.